Images of Old Hawaiʻi

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Selective Service

June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to Austria-Hungary’s throne, and his wife, Sophie, were visiting Sarajevo; Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip assassinated the couple.  A month later, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia.

Within days, other countries got into the fray, including, Germany, Russia, France and United Kingdom; US President Woodrow Wilson announced the US would remain neutral.

Long before the US entered the war a number of men from Hawaiʻi had entered the Army and Navy.  The preparedness movement of 1915 and 1916 and the creation of Army units stimulated the enlistments.  When the US was actually in the war, the local interest increased.

“By a curious irony, the very first men who left Hawaiʻi for the battlefields of Europe were a couple of German reservists who sailed from Honolulu during the first week of August, 1914, but were captured by the British before they got across the Atlantic.”  (Kuykendall)

On April 6, 1917, two days after the US Senate voted 82 to 6 to declare war against Germany, the US House of Representatives endorsed the decision by a vote of 373 to 50, and the US formally entered the First World War.

At the time, the US Army was comparatively small.  On May 18, 1917, the Selective Service Act was passed authorizing the President to increase temporarily the military establishment of the US. The Selective Service System was responsible for the process of selecting men for induction into the military service, from the initial registration to the actual delivery of men to military training camps.

It was a “supervised decentralization.” Folks in Washington were responsible for formulating policy; Governors of the 48 states, the District of Columbia and the territories of Alaska, Hawaiʻi and Puerto Rico managed the operation of drafting men for military service.

Local boards were established for each county or similar subdivision in each state, and for each 30,000 persons (approximately) in each city or county with a population over 30,000.

4,648 local draft boards were spread across the country; they were responsible for registering men, classifying them, taking into consideration needs for manpower in certain industries and in agriculture, as well as other deferments, determining the order in which registrants would be called, calling registrants and getting them to training centers.

There were three registrations. The first, on June 5, 1917, was for all men between the ages of 21 and 31. The second, on June 5, 1918, registered those who attained age 21 after June 5, 1917.

A supplemental registration was held on August 24, 1918, for those becoming 21 years old after June 5, 1918. This was included in the second registration. The third registration was held on September 12, 1918, for men age 18 through 45. (archives-gov)

The operation of the Selective Service System in Hawaiʻi was different from its operation throughout the rest of the country.  First of all, Hawaiʻi was not required to furnish any men for the first draft in 1917.  For subsequent calls, Hawaiʻi adopted its own process.  (Kuykendall)

The order numbers for Hawaiʻi’s registrants were not determined by the drawings held in Washington, but by special drawings held in Honolulu.

For Hawaiʻi, President Wilson, on recommendation of Governor Pinkham, named July 31, 1917 as Registration Day, and on that day all men in the territory between the ages of 21 and 30, both inclusive, except members of the National Guard and those in regular service, were required to appear at their draft board.

In order to insure a complete registration, an extensive publicity campaign was carried on. The President’s proclamation was translated into Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish, Hawaiian and the three Filipino dialects of Visayan, Ilocano, and Tagalog.

At the close of the day it was found that 26,335 men had registered in the six districts of the territory. With the addition of late registrants (including National Guardsmen, who were not at first required to register) the number amounted to more than 27,000. (July 31, 1917)

The first number, 16, was drawn by Governor Pinkham shortly before 9 o’clock in the morning. This meant that the six men in Hawaiʻi having the serial number 16 would be the first called for service in this territory, unless they were exempted. The drawing was then continued by Boy Scouts in relays.  (For Hawaiʻi’s second call (July 31, 1918,) the number who registered was less than 2,500.)

Over twenty-four million American men registered for the draft for the First World War in 1917 and 1918.   (In 1918, the Supreme Court ruled that the World War I draft did not violate the United States Constitution in the Selective Draft Law Cases. The Court summarized the history of conscription in England and in colonial America, noting the Framers envisioned compulsory military service as a governmental power.)

Over 10,000 men and women from the Territory of Hawaiʻi served in “the Great War,” “The war to end all wars.”

OK, other than a slight modification in the selective service selection process, that’s pretty straight forward; was there any other quirk in the Hawaiʻi process?

Well, yes.

In reviewing World War I service records, one of the categories on the standard form is “Race: White or Colored”.  It seems that some Hawaiians who served in WWI were noted as “Hawaiian;” however, there are others who were identified as “White” on their service cards.

In reviewing some Hawaiian sounding surnames, such as Kaai – some of the men with last names Kaai were noted as “Hawaiian” on their service records, while others were labeled “White.”  (Check out the album images.)

A notable Hawaiian surname is Kahanamoku; however, Duke didn’t serve in the military in WWI (reportedly, he served training Red Cross volunteers in water lifesaving techniques and toured the nation with other American aquatic champions to raise funds for the Red Cross.)

But, Duke’s younger brother, David, did.  David’s WWI military service card notes his race as “White.” (Hawaiʻi State Archives.)  (Lots of information here from US Archives, Hawaiʻi Archives and Kuykendall.)

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Lāhainā Historic District

This is a hard one … obviously, these are gone; but they are not forgotten. It is merely given to give some context to what was lost; as well as a reminder for us to not forget the lives and property lost by others.

The first capital of the kingdom of Hawai‘i, Lāhainā, was also once a bustling whaling town and plantation settlement. To recognize and preserve its rich history, two sets of historic districts have been created in Lāhainā.

The first, the Lāhainā Historic District encompassing about 1,665 acres, was added to the National Park Service’s (NPS) National Historic Landmarks Program in December 1962.  Maui County Historic District Boundaries 1 and 2 cover about 65 acres in Lāhainā.

This summary highlights the nine structures that were identified in the Lāhainā Historic District (NPS;) the principal historic structures and sites include the following.

Because these are also part of the Lāhainā Historic Trail, I am using the Lāhainā Restoration Foundation numbering for each.

14 – Court House
This solid, two-story stone building stands on Wharf Street, in the square bounded by Wharf, Hotel, Front and Canal Streets (on the site of the old stone fort.)  The Court House Square is famed today for its banyan tree, planted by the sheriff of Lāhainā in 1873 and proclaimed today as ‘Hawaii’s largest.’

After an 1858 violent windstorm damaged government buildings here, a new ‘Lahaina Court and Custom House and Government Offices,’ was completes by December, 1859.  In addition to the offices mentioned above, it contained the Governor’s office, post office and ‘a room in which to starve the jury into unanimity.’

16 – Pioneer Hotel
Built in 1901 and therefore not strictly connected with Lāhainā’s most significant era, this well-known hotel is nevertheless a key part of the Lāhainā scene (corner of Wharf and Hotel Streets.)

The description of the hotel in one guide book – ‘a large box of a building … with a wide balcony and decorative wooden railing’ – may be accurate, but it fails to convey the tropical atmosphere of Lāhainā’s first hotel.

18 – Old Spring House
The Old Spring House is said to have been built by the Rev. William Richards in 1823 to enclose a spring to supply water not only for his own dwelling nearby, but for the entire community and for ships anchored off the town.

According to local tradition, a hand pump here was visited by crews of sailors who ‘constantly rolled huge casks for water.’  The Spring House apparently is thus one of the few remaining physical links with the whaling era.

21 – Baldwin House
Completed early in 1835, Dr. Dwight Baldwin and his family occupied this two-story home, built of coral blocks, it until Dr. Baldwin was transferred to Honolulu in 1868 (some sources say the Baldwins lived in the house until 1871.)  It is one of the oldest and best preserved missionary dwellings.

Dr. Baldwin, in addition to serving as pastor of the Hawaiian church at Lāhainā and, for a time, as seamen’s chaplain, was a medical doctor; and he was government physician for the islands of Maui, Moloka‘i, and Lāna‘i.  Dr. Baldwin’s son, Henry P. Baldwin, was born in this house.

44 – United States Marine Hospital
Around 1842, this hospital was established for sick and injured American merchant seamen.  The hospital could accommodate about 60 men; it’s on the landward side of Front Street, between Kenui and Baker Streets, about 0.6 mile north of the Baldwin House.

In 1865, the structure was sold to the Episcopal Church and became a school for girls, and during the 1870s it was turned into a vicarage and served as such for more than 30 years.

48 – Maria Lanakila First Catholic Church
The first resident Roman Catholic priests arrived at Lahaina on April 21, 1846.  A church was built on the present site that same year, but it was replaced by a new structure in 1858 (Waine‘e and Dickenson Streets.)

The present concrete church, erected in 1927-1928, was built on the same foundation and is almost a replica of the older frame structure, it is said that the original ceiling was retained in the new building.

50 – Hale Aloha
The predecessor of this building, known as the Hale Halewai, or Hale Lai, is sometimes said to have been built as early as 1823; and it, instead of the Waine‘e Church, is occasionally claimed as the first stone church in the island (behind the Episcopal Cemetery in about the center of the large block bounded by Waine‘e, Hale and Chapel Streets and Prison Road.)

The meetinghouse was in bad condition by 1855 and the church voted to rebuild completely, the walls being ‘too old fashioned to be tolerated in these go-ahead days.’  The present building, called ‘Hale Aloha,’ was completed in 1858 and was ‘the largest sectional meeting house of its time.’  In 1860, the government fitted it out for use as an English Church.

53 – Old Prison (Hale Pa‘ahao)
In addition to ordinary criminals, the authorities at Lāhainā generally had on their hands a number of boisterous seamen who had run afoul of the law in one way or another during their periods of ‘refreshment’ ashore.  During the 1830s and 1840s prisoners usually were confined in the fort which stood on the seaward side of the present square (see the Court House above.)

A new prison was started in 1852.  The main cell block, built of planks, was constructed in that year, but the wall around the grounds, built of coral blocks from the old fort, was not erected until about 1854 (at the corner of Waine‘e Street and Prison Road.)  Prisoners performed much of the labor.

56 -57 -Waine‘e Church and Cemetery (Waiola Cemetery and Church)
For several years after the American Board missionaries reached Lāhainā in 1823, services were held in temporary structures. In 1828 the chiefs, led by Hoapili, proposed to build a new stone church, and the present site was selected (on Waine‘e Street, between Chapel and Shaw Streets.)

The cornerstone was laid on September 14, 1828, for this “first stone meeting-house built at the Islands.”  Dedicated on March 4, 1832, this large, two-story, galleried Waine‘e Church was twice destroyed by Kauaula winds and once, in 1894, by a fire of incendiary origin.  The present church structure was dedicated in 1953, at which time the name was changed to Waiola.

The adjoining cemetery is said to date from 1823. It contains the body of Keōpūolani, wife of Kamehameha the Great and mother of Kamehameha II and Kamehameha III.  Other prominent Hawaiian nobles interred here include Governor Hoapili, King Kaumuali‘i, Princess Nahi‘ena‘ena, Queen Kalākua and Governess Liliha.

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young 1 Comment

Pioneer Company

The coming of Henry Obookiah (ʻŌpūkahaʻia) and other young Hawaiians to the continent had awakened a deep Christian sympathy in the churches and moved the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) to establish a mission in the Hawaiian Islands.

Among the other Hawaiian students at the Foreign Mission School were Thomas Hopu, William Kanui, John Honoliʻi and Prince Humehume (son of Kauaiʻi’s King Kaumuali‘i.)

When asked “Who will return with these boys to their native land to teach the truths of salvation?”  Hiram Bingham and his classmate, Asa Thurston, were the first to respond and offer their services to the Board.  (Congregational Quarterly)

Bingham and Thurston were ordained at Goshen, Ct on September 29, 1819; it was the first ordination of foreign missionaries in the State of Connecticut.

On October 23, 1819, the Pioneer Company of American Protestant missionaries from the northeast US set sail on the Thaddeus for the Sandwich Islands (now known as Hawai‘i.)

There were seven American couples sent by the ABCFM to convert the Hawaiians to Christianity in this first company.

These included two Ordained Preachers, Hiram Bingham and his wife Sybil and Asa Thurston and his wife Lucy; two Teachers, Mr. Samuel Whitney and his wife Mercy and Samuel Ruggles and his wife Mary; a Doctor, Thomas Holman and his wife Lucia; a Printer, Elisha Loomis and his wife Maria; and a Farmer, Daniel Chamberlain, his wife and five children.

Although a large part of the motivation for the Hawaiʻi missionary movement, Henry ʻŌpūkahaʻia unfortunately died of typhus fever in 1818 and didn’t return home to teach the gospel.  However, his book, “Memoirs of Henry Obookiah,” was the inspiration for this and subsequent Hawaiian missionary companies.

The Prudential Committee of the ABCFM in giving instructions to the pioneers of 1819 said: “Your mission is a mission of mercy, and your work is to be wholly a labor of love. … Your views are not to be limited to a low, narrow scale, but you are to open your hearts wide, and set your marks high. You are to aim at nothing short of covering these islands with fruitful fields, and pleasant dwellings and schools and churches, and of Christian civilization.”  (The Friend)

After 164-days at sea, on April 4, 1820, the Thaddeus arrived and anchored at Kailua-Kona on the Island of Hawaiʻi.  Hawai‘i’s “Plymouth Rock” is about where the Kailua pier is today.

By the time the Pioneer Company arrived, Kamehameha I had died and the centuries-old kapu system had been abolished; through the actions of King Kamehameha II (Liholiho,) with encouragement by former Queens Kaʻahumanu and Keōpūolani (Liholiho’s mother,) the Hawaiian people had already dismantled their heiau and had rejected their religious beliefs.

One of the first things Bingham and his fellow missionaries did was begin to learn the Hawaiian language and create an alphabet for a written format of the language.   Their emphasis was on teaching and preaching.

On July 14, 1826, the missionaries selected a 12-letter alphabet for the written Hawaiian language, using five vowels (a, e, i, o, and u) and seven consonants (h, k, l, m, n, p and w) in their “Report of the committee of health on the state of the Hawaiian language.”   The report is signed by Hiram Bingham and Levi Chamberlain.

The arrival of the first company of American missionaries in Hawaiʻi marked the beginning of Hawaiʻi’s phenomenal rise to literacy. The chiefs became proponents for education and edicts were enacted by the King and the council of chiefs to stimulate the people to reading and writing.

By 1831, in just eleven years from the first arrival of the missionaries, Hawaiians had built 1,103 schoolhouses. This covered every district throughout the eight major islands and serviced an estimated 52,882 students.  (Laimana)

The proliferation of schoolhouses was augmented by the printing of 140,000 copies of the pīʻāpā (elementary Hawaiian spelling book) by 1829 and the staffing of the schools with 1,000-plus Hawaiian teachers.  (Laimana)

Interestingly, these same early missionaries taught their lessons in Hawaiian, rather than English.  In part, the mission did not want to create a separate caste and portion of the community as English-speaking Hawaiians.  In later years, the instruction, ultimately, was in English.

Within five years of the missionaries’ arrival, a dozen chiefs had sought Christian baptism and church membership, including the king’s regent Kaʻahumanu.  The Hawaiian people followed their native leaders, accepting the missionaries as their new priestly class.  The process culminated in Hawaiian King Kamehameha III’s adoption of Christianity and a Biblically-based constitution in 1840.  (Schulz)

Over the course of a little over 40-years (1820-1863) (the “Missionary Period”,) about 180-men and women in twelve Companies served in Hawaiʻi to carry out the mission of the ABCFM in the Hawaiian Islands.

As did all residents of the Islands, the Missionaries had to surrender their American citizenship before they could preach. They, and their children…and their childrens’ children were Hawaiian subjects – not Americans.

US Secretary of State Daniel Webster wrote to the Commissioner in Hawaiʻi in 1851, “You inform us that many American citizens have gone to settle in the islands; if so they have ceased to be American citizens.”

“The Government of the United States must, of course, feel an interest in them not extended to foreigners, but by the law of nations they have no right further to demand the protection of this Government.”

“Whatever aid or protection might under any circumstances be given them must be given, not as a matter of right on their part, but in consistency with the general policy and duty of the Government and its relations with friendly powers.” (Webster, July 14, 1851)

In 1844, as Hawaiian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Dr. Gerrit Judd wrote the ABCFM encouraging it to allow missionaries to become naturalized Hawaiian citizens, “[The missionary] children born here are native born subjects of the king and would many of them settle here were it not for the anxiety of their parents.”  (Schulz)

The image shows the early Mission house and Chapel in Honolulu (the precursor of today’s Kawaiahaʻo Church.)

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Mabel Leilani Smyth

Pālama, a sleepy neighborhood of neat little cottages and taro patches, was home to mostly working-class Hawaiian families; on June 1, 1896, a chapel was built and presented to Central Union Church.

Social worker James Arthur Rath, Sr and his wife, Ragna Helsher Rath, turned Pālama Chapel into Pālama Settlement (in September 1906,) a chartered, independent, non-sectarian organization.

The Raths established a day-camp for children with tuberculosis, a pure milk depot, a day nursery, a night school, low-rent housing and the Territory’s first public nursing department.

Public health nursing was started in Hawaiʻi by the Free Kindergarten and Children’s Aid Association in 1897, when Mrs. Alice (Haviland) Thompson, nurse at Kamehameha School, volunteered her services to work in the Kindergartens in Honolulu.

In 1900, as Honolulu health officials attempted to rid the nearby Chinatown area of bubonic plague, fire destroyed a four-block section. The Pālama chapel’s staff located housing for many of the displaced and took care of the injured and children. It also ministered to the needs of immigrants who moved into the Pālama area soon after arriving in the Islands.

In 1908 the College Club (a voluntary civic association) became interested in the tuberculosis problem and employed a nurse to do tuberculosis work in the City of Honolulu. Because it was thought that the nurse would have easier access to the district homes, she was given a Board of Health badge.

When the Tuberculosis Bureau was established in the Board of Health in 1910, the College Club nurse worked under the direction and supervision of that bureau until the latter part of 1910, when Pālama Settlement established itself as the centralized organization for public health nursing activities in Honolulu.

Shortly after, Pālama assumed the direction and supervision of all nurses and nursing activities in the city, including the two nurses employed in the Board of Health to do tuberculosis nursing.

By 1910, nine nurses were employed in the city: two by the Legislature, or Board of Health, one by the College Club, one by the Chinese Consul, one by the United Chinese Society, and four by Pālama Settlement.  (Smyth; The Friend, September 1, 1932)

Mabel Smyth, sometimes referenced as “Hawaiʻi’s Florence Nightingale” was Hawaiʻi’s first native Hawaiian public health nurse in the territory of Hawaii.

The daughter of a part-Hawaiian mother, Julia Goo Smyth (1867-1948,) and an Irish Ship Captain father, Halford Hamill Smyth (1851-1907,) Mabel was born in 1882 in Kona (some say she was born in Honolulu.) Halford Smyth died in 1907 leaving his wife with 5 children ranging in age from 8 to 16 (Mabel, the second oldest, was 15 at the time.)  (Connerton)

The family then moved to Honolulu where Smyth was involved with the Pālama Settlement, and she worked as a helper in the home of Pālama Head Worker, James Rath.

In 1912 Smyth traveled to the mainland with the Rath family, and in Springfield, MA she left them to begin her nursing training at the Springfield Hospital Training School.   (Connerton)

Smyth graduated from the Springfield Hospital training school in 1914, and returned to Hawaiʻi to begin work at the Pālama settlement in 1915.

When she applied for her position on the Pālama nursing service she explained her interest in district health nursing “One can do more good for humanity by working among the people district nurses do, and I naturally like to work among that class of people.”

In 1917 when the Board of Nursing established a licensure requirement – Smyth was #52 granted on August 30, 1917.

When Smyth took over as Pālama’s head nurse in 1918 there were seven Pālama dispensaries in the city, each with a nurse assigned to that district.  Nurses spent about 45-minutes of their day in the office, and the rest was divided between school visits, home visits and dispensary hours.  (Connerton)

Smythe went on to lead two of the most influential public health nursing services in the territory.  She was a charter member of the Hawaiʻi Nursing Association (called the Honolulu Nurses’ Club).  She joined the Honolulu chapter of the American Red Cross, and she served on the Hawaiʻi Board of Nursing.

In 1923, by act of the Legislature, the title of all nurses employed by the Board of Health, who were known as tuberculosis or school nurse, was changed to “public health nurse.” (Smyth; The Friend, September 1, 1932)

What is public health nursing?  “Public health nursing is an organized community service rendered by graduate nurses to the individual, family and community.  This service includes the interpretation for the correction of defects, prevention of disease and the promotion of health, and may include skilled care for the sick in their homes.”

“Our service is divided into four distinct divisions, namely, maternity, health supervision, morbidity (which includes non-communicable and communicable diseases) and social service.” (Smyth; The Friend, September 1, 1932)

In 1926, Smyth joined with other public health nurses to initiate the University of Hawaiʻi course on public health nursing.  This program was vital for local nurses whose only other option for public health training was to go to the mainland to study.  (Connerton)

When the Bureau of maternal and Child Health was organized in 1926, the nurse services expanded island wide.  Miss Claira Figely was the first supervisor of nurses, followed by Mabel Smyth who was Director of the Bureau of Maternal and Infant Hygiene.

Hawaiʻi was the first, and at times the only, US Territory or State that required formal Public Health training for employment as Public Health nurse.  (Tabrah)

In 1936 Smyth was scheduled for a small surgery.  She prepared her staff for a planned absence, but she never returned.  Smyth died at age 43, after 21 years of service to the public health community of Hawaii.

Smyth was widely mourned in the territory, and after her death a committee formed to establish a memorial to the “Hawaiian Florence Nightingale.”  Over $110,000 raised for her memorial building, with over 4,000-people making contributions.

On January 4 1941, the CW Dickey-designed ‘Mabel Smyth Memorial Building’ was dedicated on the Queens Hospital grounds at the corner of Punchbowl and Beretania Streets in Honolulu.  The new building was the headquarters for Hawaii’s professional nursing and medical organizations.

In 1991, ownership of the building and property passed from the Queen’s Medical Center to the State of Hawaiʻi, in an exchange for nearby undeveloped land (Miller Street Triangle) that was needed by the hospital expansion.

In 1998, DLNR sold the building and adjacent grounds at a public auction for $5 million to the Queen Emma Foundation.  (PBN) Queen’s later renamed it ‘Queen’s Conference Center’ and relegated the Smyth name to the ‘Mabel Smyth Auditorium.’

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC

 

by Peter T Young Leave a Comment

Nā Lani ʻEhā

Nā Lani ʻEhā (The Royal Four; the Heavenly Four) are four siblings who, among other accomplishments, demonstrated extraordinary talent as musicians and composers.  They were born to High Chief Caesar Kapaʻakea and High Chiefess Analeʻa Keohokālole.

They were King Kalākaua (1836-1891,) Queen Liliʻuokalani (1838-1917,) Princess Likelike (1851-1887) and Prince Leleiōhoku (1854-1877.)

In 1995, the Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame recognized Nā Lani ʻEhā as “The Patrons of the Hawaiian Culture,” noting they “were not only giants in the field of Hawaiian music but form the very cornerstones of subsequent Hawaiian culture and arts, and as such, ‘preside’ over the greats of Hawaiian music honored” in the Hall of Fame.

David Kalākaua (1836-1891)

David Kalākaua was hānai (adopted) by the chiefess Haʻaheo Kaniu, who took him to Maui. When Kalākaua was four, he returned to Oʻahu to begin his education at the Royal School.

On February 12, 1874, nine days after the passing of King Lunalilo, an election was held between the repeat candidate David Kalākaua and Queen Emma – widow of King Kamehameha IV.  Kalākaua won.

Click HERE for a link to Hawaiʻi Ponoʻi:

Lydia Liliʻu Kamakaʻeha Paki (1838-1917)

Lydia Liliʻu Kamakaʻeha was hānai to Abner Pākī and his wife Laura Kōnia, and grew up with their daughter, Princess Bernice Pauahi.  In her youth she was called ‘Lydia’ or ‘Liliʻu.’

By age 15, Liliʻu was already an accomplished musician and composer who could write music.  Her best-known song ‘Aloha ʻOe’ was the first Hawaiian “hit” song outside of the Islands.

On April 10, 1877, King Kalākaua named her heir apparent to the throne of Hawaiʻi and changed her name to Liliʻuokalani.  King Kalākaua died on January 20, 1891; Liliʻuokalani succeeded him to the Hawaiian throne.

Click HERE for a link to Aloha ʻOe:

Miriam Likelike (1851-1887)

Unlike her brothers and sister, Princess Miriam Likelike was raised in Hilo, Hawaiʻi. It was after her return to Honolulu as a teenager that her musical endeavors began in earnest.  With her sister, she led one of the three royal music clubs that held regular friendly competitions to outdo each other in song and poetry.

‘ʻĀinahau,’ the most famous of Likelike’s compositions, was written about their residence in Waikīkī. She wrote most of her compositions there.

On October 16, 1875, a child was born to Princess Likelike and Archibald Cleghorn.  The child, the only direct descendant of the Kalākaua dynasty, was named Princess Kaʻiulani.

Click HERE for a link to Ainahau:

William Pitt Leleiōhoku (1854-1877)

The youngest of “The Royal Four”, Prince Leleiōhoku was said by his sister, Lili`uokalani to have a talent for composition “really in advance” of the two princesses. He founded the Kawaihau Singing Club and soon he and his colleagues were winning most of the royal song club competitions.

When his older brother became king, Kalākaua’s first act as King was to appoint Leleiōhoku, as successor to the throne, thereby restoring to the crown the function of selecting kings.

Leleiōhoku married Ruth Keʻelikōlani, great-granddaughter of Kamehameha, a grand-niece to Kamehameha II and III, and a half-sister of Kamehameha IV and V.  They had two children, only one of whom – William Pitt Kīnaʻu – survived childhood (but he died at the age of 17.)  While serving as governor of Hawai‘i Island, Leleiōhoku died, only twenty-two years old.

Click HERE for a link to Hawaiian War Chant:

Click HERE for a link to Hole Waimea

A prior program at the Hawaiian Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives focused on compositions written by Nā Lani ʻEha, four royal siblings, King Kalākaua, Queen Liliʻuokalani, Princess Likelike and Prince Leleiōhoku.

Aaron Mahi, Kuʻuipo Kumukahi and Kaʻala Carmack first participated in a panel discussion about the four famous siblings.

Click HERE for a link to the 1-hour panel discussion:

In recognizing Nā Lani ʻEhā, the Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame also called to attention their early music teacher, Juliette Montague Cooke of the Chiefs’ Children’s School.

Founded in 1839, O‘ahu’s first school was called the Chiefs’ Children’s School (The Royal School.)  The cornerstone of the original school was laid on June 28, 1839 in the area of the old barracks of ʻIolani Palace (at about the site of the present State Capitol of Hawaiʻi.)

The school was created by King Kamehameha III, with the main goal of this school was to groom the next generation of the highest ranking chief’s children of the realm and secure their positions for Hawaii’s Kingdom.

Seven families were eligible under succession laws stated in the 1840 Constitution of the Kingdom of Hawai‘i; Kamehameha III called on seven boys and seven girls to board in the Chief’s Children’s School.

For fourteen years, the Cookes lived with and taught the future kings and queens.  Many of the children became boarders at very early ages; four of the students were under the age of four.  (Liliʻuokalani was only three when she went to live with the Cookes.)    (Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame)

Cooke was an excellent musician, and introduced them to the joy of singing.  Since chanting had been the tradition in Hawaiian culture, a latent natural talent was released when the Hawaiians were introduced to the phenomena of melody and harmony. They embraced their music lessons with verve and enthusiasm; singing came to them naturally, and they loved their music lessons.

Cooke and her husband are buried in the Mission Cemetery behind the Kawaiahaʻo Church, and her tombstone has simply the word, “Mother”, because that was what the children at the school called her.  (Hawaiian Music Hall of Fame)

The image shows Nā Lani ʻEhā (Kalākaua, Liliʻuokalani, Likelike and Leleiōhoku.)  

© 2024 Hoʻokuleana LLC